Internship is a simple concept really: a brief, mandated period of practical experience intended to codify theoretical learning and prepare the student for professional practice. It is hardly a unique concept to the architecture profession; however, architects have been less successful at integrating the process into the profession. For too many young architects, internship is a self-taught, selfmonitored
process with little or no direction from experienced professionals, and a lot of expensive fees and complicated paperwork. Too many firms view interns as discount employees, not realizing that it is acceptable provide less monetary compensation because they are suppose to be providing educational compensation: interns do not know everything and therefore accept less pay, incomplete benefits, and work legally questionable hours in hopes that they will receive the education required to become competent professionals.

What if firms were licensed by NCARB to conduct IDP? At first it could just be a certification program-- some seminars, a point person, and a requirement for continuing education to maintain the certification-- until it could be phased in as mandatory for employing interns.

A basic fact of consumerism: the best qualified interns-- the ones who really want to become licensed-- will seek out the certified firms, knowing in advance what they are getting (no vague "yeah, we support IDP" at the interview only to find out that means all they do is rubber stamp the forms after you have begged enough), and take their talents to the firms offering the best return on long hours and small
paychecks. Other firms would then have to either improve their internship program or provide better compensation (although in an ideal world, all firms would do both). Likewise, it would be possible that if at hiring, an intern specifically enrolled to participate in a certified IDP program, it would reflect negatively in a review if the intern were not maintaing records and seeking to fufill IDP requirements as
prescribed.

Certification of IDP training firms is not more paperwork (and ideally would be managed completely online without the need for so much actual paper), but the system needed to bridge the gap between the structure of the university environment and the independence of professional practice, and is not as divisive and potentially limiting as setting up teaching firms. It would reduce the vast grey area and clearly establish firms as either quality environments to pursue licensure or subpar environments that offer a questionable employment experience. Of course, in some areas one must take the job that is available, and some firms will be resistant to more regulation. Nevertheless, the overall the quality of internship (and of future licensed architects) would improve because simply signing off on paperwork would lose a firm its certification, and interns would be motivated toward licensure through an organized group mentality rather than lose focus when presented with another three or four years of largely self-directed and self-motivated learning in addition to the five or six they have already put in.